Let it burn
by Anora-Ascome
Summary: "I assure you; while I look like a ghost, I'm no spirit or demon. I'm nothing but a girl struggling to make her way in an deadly world. I bleed, I love, and someday, I'll die."


_Sorry for spelling and grammar I cant do either so there's no need to tell me, if you'd like to be my Beta let me know xxx_

Chapter one

I stood at the sink washing dishes but occasionally glancing out the window to watch Daryl. He had been working on the new garden fence since 7am, I had know idea where the man found the energy considering he had been out hunting all night and just recently got back. I could see the sweat pouring off him but I knew he wouldn't take his top off. He didn't like people seeing the scars his father had given him as a younger lad, even his older brother Merle didn't know about them. I did though, I was the one person Daryl trusted. I stopped washing the dishes and walked over to the fridge, pulling out a bottle of beer before stepping out the back door. He never looked up as I walked across the lawn in just my dressing gown, it wasn't the first time he had seen me in it. I liked to lounge around the house in it when I wasn't working at the local bar. He stopped when I held out the bottle.

"You know the fence can wait, its not like I need it anyway" I told him as he opened the bottle with his teeth and took a drink wiping the sweet off his brow. I lived on the outskirts of town and my garden backed of into the forest. I liked to think the whole forest was my garden.

"Its my fault it broke" he mumbled putting the drink down and picking up the hammer again. I watched him as he knocked nails into the new wooden planks.

"You didn't tell Merle to get in your truck, its not your fault he ran the truck through the fence" I said loudly so he could here me over the banging. He stopped and looked at me.

"If I had been sensible I would have told him I was driving" he told me. Though we both knew when Merle had drink in him he wouldn't listen to anyone. If Daryl had argued with him he probably would have ended up hurt.

"Yeah well" I replied "If I had been sensible I would have let him sleep here, so he wouldn't have to drive home" Daryl shook his head a worried look crossed his face for just a split second if I didn't know him so well I would have missed it.

"You know I don't like Merle around you when he's drunk" he told me honestly "You know what he's like with woman" he added quietly.

"And you know am more than capable of looking after myself" I replied with a small smile. Daryl looked down at my dressing gown and turned his gaze away.

"If your going to be out here would you please put some cloths on"

"Why? You don't usually ask me to" I replied confused "Its my day off"

"listen" I did as he said and held my breath listing, in the distance I could here Merle's bike. Dame it. Without a word I quickly turned away from Daryl and ran into the house to get dressed. I locked my bedroom door and quickly got dressed into a pair of white skinny jeans, black vest top and a pair of black knee high flat boots. By the time I had brushed my hair and got back into the garden Merle was talking to Daryl but he wasn't alone he and two of his criminal friends with him. As soon as he saw me he gave me a huge smile.

"There she is, hay honey bun you got any alcohol left in that fringe of yours?" he asked.

"Yeah, you know where it is" I added as he walked past me. His two friends, John and Andy if I remembered correctly where looking at me. If I remembered right, Daryl said Andy had been in jail for assault and John was in for theft. "Daryl, did you bring the paper with you?"

"Yeah its in the seat of the truck" he mumbled his eyes not leaving Andy or John who's eyes never left me. I ignored my unwanted visitors and walked towards Daryl's truck, pulling the door open I grabbed this morning paper and shut the door again before parking my ass on the grass with my back against the front wheel to read the paper. I saw Merle walk out the house with beer for himself and his mates before opening the paper and scanning the pages. A few pages in my eyes caught sight of something usual. It was all about a business man heading to work when a tramp sunk his teeth into the man's shoulder and he had kept eating the man until the police had gunned him down with a bullet to the head, four shots in the torso hadn't worked. How was that possible? surely if your got shot in the chest four times you would be dead. Confused and waning answers I walked back over to the guys.

"Hay, four bullets in the chest would kill a guy, right?" I asked anyone who would answer.

"Depends, why you asking?" Daryl replied not taking his eyes of the fence.

"Just something I saw in the paper" I explained "This tramp bit a man and he wouldn't stop so the police shot him four times in the chest and he still didn't stop, not until they shot him in the head"

"Was probably high on drugs, heard a story a few year ago about a guy high on drugs being shot six times before dying. Something to do with adrenaline apparently" Merle replied taking a swig of his beer.

"Guess that makes sense" I mumbled "Still pretty weird though"

"You do weird stuff when your high" Merle told me.

"You would know" I grinned cheekily, I quickly dived out the way and Merle made a playful swing at me.

"Careful Anora, don't disrespect your elders" Merle warned waving a finger at me. He was only twenty years older than me. Hell there was twenty years between my uncle and his girlfriend and they had a three year old child together. Merle had just turned forty-eight a couple of months ago. I had just turned twenty-eight last week and Daryl was tuning thirty-nine in a month. So there was pretty much ten years between us all.

"So" Andy said looking at me making conversation and he took a small sip of beer "Merle tells me you used to be in the modelling business" he said with a small smile.

"I did it for a couple of years in my early twenties but I don't like being told what to do so it didn't last long" I replied turning away from him and sitting on the grass a couple of feet from Daryl. I don't know why but when I felt worried I always found myself hovering around Daryl. Probably because if shit hit the fan I would hope he would be kind enough to at least stick up for me but I was probably hoping for to much. Daryl and especially Merle liked me fighting my own battles, they only really interfered if they knew I was going to get a serious beating.

"Well Merle mention your boyfriend left you a couple of weeks ago..."

"Only because Merle chased him away" I interrupted Andy, glaring at Merle who lazily shrugged his shoulder and nodded to where Daryl was.

"He helped"

"He was a git" Daryl said like that was the end of the discussion.

"Anyway" Andy said cutting in before anyone else could cut him off "I was wondering if you wanted to get a drink tonight, you know get to know each other better" he smiled down at me. He wasn't a bad looking block but before I could even reply Daryl was in his face.

"Not even if you were the last two people on this earth" he growled at Andy.

"Back of Daryl, you ain't her big brother and you certainly aren't her boyfriend or husband so what you think doesn't really count" Andy argued back. I turned to look at Merle to see what he was making of his but he was just smiling like if a fight broke out he would be more than happy to encourage it by shouting advice. I picked myself up of the floor but no one was paying attention to me any more they where looking at Daryl and Andy.

"She ain't going out with someone like you, I know your girlfriends don't last long. I wont pretend I don't know why"

"Look who's talking you've been though as many girls as I have and they didn't last long either" Andy snapped back.

"I didn't get sent to jail for beating one of them up though" Daryl snarled. Ok this was going far enough and clearly John and Merle where enjoying it to much to stop it. I quickly stepped in between the two of them. Both towered over me but I was just over five foot tall so that wasn't hard.

"Ok Daryl back down. Its my life I'm in tilted to go fuck it up any way I please" I said looking at him before tuning to Andy "And no, I don't want to go out for a drink. I've heard how you treat your girlfriends and quite frankly if you even laid a finger on me I'd kick your ball so far up your body they'd be coming out of your mouth" Merle and John both burst out laughing, trust Merle to laugh at me when I was being deadly serious. "so Daryl" I smiled at him "When are you planning on taking me hunting, you promised it would be this week"

"We could have gone tonight but your working tomorrow" Daryl mumbled feeling uncomfortable about talking about this in front of everyone, he knew Merle would annoy him real bad when they where alone.

"I can pretend I'm ill, phone work today and tell them I'm sick. Ain't like there gonna notice me running riot round the woods unless they came looking for me, even then they wouldn't find me" I smiled.

"Fine we'll head out after lunch if you want, we'll only be gone two nights to just bring a spare top, some water and we'll catch our food, you like rabbit right?" Daryl asked.

"Sure do, I'll eat anything you put in front of me" I smiled "And I promise no messing around, this survival stuff could help save my life someday" I added honestly.

"Yeah you heard her baby brother" Merle commented with a smirk "No messing around"


End file.
